1. TAKE CARE TO DO IT RIGHT THE FIRST TRY: Taking a little extra time BEFORE attempting a passage to think how you want it to sound is like adding hot sauce to your favorite dish. It will spice up your whole practice hour by setting those brain cells on fire. Use that most powerful tool in your toolkit: your brain! Use it first and use it often. 2. USE A CUP MUTE TO EXTEND LOWER REGISTER: Push into the extra resistance the mute provides while bending the pitch downward from the center of the lips. Extending the lower register helps extension in the upper register, but can be frustrating when it won't work. Don't give up, try a few times each day until more buzz is attained. Incremental progress is actually more long lasting anyway, so take heart and enjoy the process. 3. USE ONLY THE AMOUNT OF EFFORT NEEDED - NO MORE, NO LESS: Focus on keeping a balance of free full air, lip "grip", and tongue placement, in other words, on proper form. You may have heard of keeping your form if you play tennis, or if you're a runner, or if you engage in any other sport or fitness regimen like yoga. So there's a proper posture or alignment which provides the best conditions for great playing. In the case of trumpet playing, avoid over-emphasis on any one of the three components of air, lip grip/buzz, and articulation. Surprisingly, the tongue can also be a a reservoir of unneeded tension, especially in the upper register. We need it to slightly elevate in the upper register to increase air pressure inside the mouth, but we don't need the tongue to become stiff. Stiffness creates a poor quality articulation as well as slow articulation speed, and contributes to cracked pitches. 4. STAY RELAXED THROUGH CHANGEOVER IN LUNG CAPACITY: If you start playing at half full, which is the comfort zone for talking and normal activity, you have no where to go but tense. This is so important a concept that I will probably address it in a different way in every set of practice tips. However, if you start from a true level of fullness in the lungs - which from a comfort standpoint is a bit uncomfortable until you've done it enough times to get used to the feeling - you can sail through the midpoint on the momentum established by the airflow generated by full lungs. So, start full and end free! You can't lose by starting and continuing to play as if lungs are full.
5. UTILIZE MUSCLE MEMORY: I don't know why it is, but playing from muscle memory produces the most efficient and beautiful tone. Unfortunately, one can't play the trumpet from muscle memory unless we're reminding the muscles every day how to play. Even a little bit every day far exceeds the cramming approach many take right before a performance. Avoid that tendency, and you'll save yourself from all kinds of stress while simultaneously creating the perfect conditions for accurate and beautiful performance. 6 - 7. TAKE PRIVATE LESSONS! Even though you may participate daily in school rehearsals, private lessons provide valuable and individually tailored feedback from a master on your instrument. Instead of addressing the generic needs of a room full of people on various instruments, a private instructor can correct bad habits and misunderstandings immediately and from personal insight, cover topics in-depth that can't be addressed in a large setting, work on solo literature, provide accountability, and a myriad of other benefits. Listening and studying with a master of your instrument grants you many of the attributes your teacher possesses. So find a teacher whose playing you admire with whom you can work well, and dig in. A world of great playing and learning is brought right to you and tailored specifically to you as an individual while holding you accountable for needed practice. Don't miss the opportunity of private study. If you can't find someone in your area, try looking for online lessons. I'll comment more about that in later posts, but know there is a plethora of options! You'll be glad you started looking sooner than later. HAPPY PRACTICING! Comments are closed.
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GlendaI'm a trumpet player and music teacher aiming in this blog to help other Trumpeters, Music Enthusiasts, Music Educators, and aspiring professionals reach their highest potential in life through the study and cultivation of musical skills. Music Education
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